Christmas Story

What is it that ties my Christmas story to the lunch date I had with friends today? It's our career choice: human services. The three of us have found our way into careers in which we serve others who are sometimes discouraged and wounded, and to quote a man on the phone today, "hurt people, hurt people."

The Christmas story he then told me, was about a real man who did quite the opposite. His story was about a man whom he met when he was young and was, himself, dislexic. This man taught him to read using the Bible. He was a man whose mother and father found him, as a baby, lying in a dumpster. A man whose birth date was unknown to him or to anyone else. This was a man who had known a great deal of sickness and pain; he had every reason to be bitter and broken down.

Instead, our principal character saw every single thing that happened, as an opportunity to share his faith. When he went to the hospital, he said, maybe there was someone there he needed to meet, or who needed to meet him. And he just took it in stride; every surgery, every disease.

It is my understanding that he was often heard saying, "The Lord giveth, and the Lord taketh away" and "Time only matters to humans. With God there is no time". I am particularly fond of the last one. Time is not my favorite part of life. I would be happy with no schedule at all, the whole rest of my life.

Anyway, I digress. I learned that this man, whose birthday was not known, also died alone, and no one knows the time of his death. When he came into the world, and when he left, as my story telling friend told me, only God knows. Then he said to me, "thank you for what you do. Remember that you never know who you are talking to, and that what you do matters. People who hurt, hurt people, don't take it personally. Just keep helping them."

It was sort of an odd little part of my day, this phone call. I'd never met this man, yet he spoke right into my heart, and he started the call by asking me if I wanted to hear a Christmas story. It seems good that I should share it with you. This was the bizarre part of my day, but it seems to have been the most profound, as well.